Chapter 28

High-Performance Liquid Chromatography

• Mobile Phase: Liquid

• Stationary Phase Separation Mechanism
- Solid Adsorption
- Liquid Layer Partition
- Ion exchange resin Ion exchange
- Microporous beads Size Exclusion
- Chemically modified resin Affinity
 HPLC Advantages vs GC

• Not limited by sample volatility or thermal

stability
• Two interacting phases
• Room temperature analysis
• Ease of sample recovery
 Instrumentation
• Solvent Reservoirs
• Pump
• Sample Injector
• Column(s)
• Detector
• Data System
 Mobile Phase Reservoirs
• Inert container with inert lines leading to the
pump are required.
• Reservoir filters (2-10 mm) at reservoir end of
solvent delivery lines
• Degassed solvent
- Vacuum filtration
- Sparge with inert gas (N2 or He)
- Ultrasonic under vacuum
• Elevate above pumps
Isocratic elution: A separation that employs a
single solvent or solvent mixture of constant
composition.

Gradient elution: Here two or more solvent

systems that differ significantly in polarity are
employed. After elution is begun; the ratio of
the solvents is varied in a programmed way,
sometimes continuously and sometimes in a
series of steps. Separation efficiency is greatly
enhanced by gradient elution.
 HPLC Pump Criteria
• Constructed of materials inert toward
solvents to be used
• Deliver high volumes (flow rates) of solvent
(to 10 mL/min)
• Deliver precise and accurate flow (<0.5%
variation)
• Deliver high pressure (to 6000 psi)
• Deliver pulse free flow
• Have low pump-head volume
• Be reliable
 HPLC Pumps: Types
• Reciprocating pumps
• Syringe pumps
• Constant pressure pumps
 Reciprocating Pumps

• One, two, or three pump heads

- more heads, less pulse
• Small head volumes (50 to 250 mL)
• Short piston stroke
• Inert pistons (generally sapphire)
• Continuous use (no refill time)
• Pulse dampeners
 Syringe Pumps

• Constant flow rate pump

• Non-pulsating flow
• Low flow rates (1 to 100 mL/min)
• Isocratic flow only
• Refill required when reservoir (~50mL)
expended
 Constant Pressure Pump

• Constant pressure pump, not constant flow

• Can deliver high pressures
• Stable flow during delivery stroke
• Stop flow on refill stroke
• Low cost
 Sample Introduction
• Valve-type injectors
- Six port fixed volume Rheodyne
reproducible injection volumes
variable loop size
easy to use, reliable
- Six port variable volume Waters
variable injection volumes without loop
change increased maintenance, operator skill
required more expensive
 Auto Injectors

• Continuous injections operator free

• Comparable precision and accuracy to
manual
• Much more expensive initially
• Much more convenient Up 100 samples
and standards with microprocessor control
 Liquid-Chromatographic Columns
Liquid-chromatographic columns are
ordinarily constructed from smooth-bore
stainless steel tubing, although heavy-
walled glass tubing is occasionally
encountered. The latter is restricted to
pressures that are lower than about 600
psi.
 Analytical Columns
Liquid-chromatographic columns range in
length from 10 to 30 cm. Normally, the columns
are straight, with added length, where needed,
being gained by coupling two or more columns
together. The inside diameter of liquid columns
is often 4 to 10 mm; the most common particle
size of packings is 5 or 10 m. The most
common column currently in use is one that is
25 cm in length, 4.6 mm inside diameter, and
packed with 5 m particles. Columns of this
type contain 40,000 to 60,000 plates/meter.
 Guard Columns
A guard column is introduced before the analytical
column to increase the life of the analytical column by
removing not only particulate matter and contaminants
from the solvents but also sample components that bind
irreversibly to the stationary phase. The guard column
serves to saturate the mobile phase with the stationary
phase so that losses of this solvent from the analytical
column are minimized. The composition of the guard-
column packing is similar to that of the analytical
column; the particle size is usually larger. When the
guard column has become contaminated, it is repacked
or discarded and replaced with a new one.
 Detectors: Unlike gas chromatography, liquid
chromatography has no detectors that are as
universally applicable and as reliable as the flame
ionization and thermal conductivity detectors. A
major challenge in the development of liquid
chromatography has been in detector improvement.
• Types of Detectors: Liquid chromatographic
detectors are of two basic types. Bulk property
detectors respond to a mobile-phase bulk property,
such as refractive index, dielectric constant, or
density. In contrast, solute property detectors
respond to some property of solutes, such as UV
absorbance, fluorescence, or diffusion current, that
is not possessed by the mobile phase.
• Absorbance Detectors: Is a Z-shaped, flow-
through cell for absorbance measurements on
eluents from a chromatographic column. Many
absorbance detectors are double-beam devices in
which one beam passes through the eluent cell
and the other through a filter to reduce its
intensity.
• Ultraviolet Absorbance Detectors with Filters:
The simplest UV absorption detectors are filter
photometers with a mercury lamp as the source.
Most commonly the intense line at 254 nm is
isolated by filters. Deuterium or tungsten filament
sources with interference filters also provide a
simple means of detecting absorbing species.
• UV Absorbance Detector with
Monochromator: There are detectors that
consist of a scanning spectrophotometer with
grating optics. Some are limited to uv radiation;
others encompass both uv and visible radiation.
The most powerful uv spectrophotometric
detectors are diode-array instruments.
• Infrared Absorbance Detectors: Two types of
infrared detectors are offered commercially.
The range of the first instrument is from 2.5 to
14.5 m or 4000 to 690 cm-1. The second type
of infrared detector is based upon Fourier
transform instruments.
• Fluorescence Detectors: Fluorescence is
observed by a photoelectric detector located at
90 deg to the excitation beam. The simplest
detectors employ a mercury excitation source
and one or more filters to isolate a band of
emitted radiation. More sophisticated
instruments are based upon a Xenon source and
employ a grating monochromator to isolate the
fluorescent radiation. An inherent advantage of
fluorescence methods is their high sensitivity,
which is typically greater by more than an order
of magnitude than most absorbance procedures.
• Refractive-Index Detectors: Refractive-index
detectors have the significant advantage of
responding to nearly all solutes. That is they are
general detectors analogous to flame or thermal
conductivity detectors in gas chromatography.
In addition, they are reliable and unaffected by
flow rate. They are, however, highly
temperature sensitive and must be maintained at
a constant temperature to a few thousandths of
a degree centigrade. Furthermore, they are not
as sensitive as most other types of detectors.
• Electrochemical Detectors: These devices
are based upon amperometry, polarography,
coulometry, and conductometry. They appear
to offer advantages, in many instances, of
high sensitivity, simplicity, convenience, and
widespread applicability.
• Mass Spectrometric Detectors: A problem in
coupling liquid chromatography with mass
spectrometry is the enormous mismatch between
the relatively large solvent volumes and the
vacuum requirements. Several interfaces have
been developed for solving this problem. In a first
type the eluent from the column is split, with only
a tiny fraction being introduced directly into the
mass spectrometer. In a second type of interface
the effluent is deposited on a continuous, moving-
belt or moving-wire that transports the solvent
and analyte to a heated chamber for removal of
the former by volatilization.
 PARTITION CHROMATOGRAPHY

Partition chromatography can be subdivided into

(i) liquid-liquid chromatography and
(ii) bonded-phase chromatography.

• With liquid-liquid, a liquid stationary phase is

retained on the surface of the packing by
physical adsorption.
• With bonded-phase, the stationary phase is
bonded chemically to the support surfaces.
 PARTITION CHROMATOGRAPHY
Early partition chromatography was the liquid-
liquid type; now the bonded-phase method has
become predominate because of certain
disadvantages of liquid-liquid systems.
• One of these disadvantages is the loss of
stationary phase by dissolution in the mobile
phase, which requires periodic recoating of the
support particles.
• Furthermore, stationary-phase solubility
problems prohibit the use of liquid-phase
packings for gradient elution.
Columns for Bonded-Phase Chromatography
The supports for the majority of bonded-phase
packings for partition chromatography are
prepared from rigid silica, or silica-based,
compositions. These solids are formed as
uniform, porous, mechanically sturdy particles
commonly having diameters of 3, 5, or 10m.
The surface of fully hydrolyzed silica is made up
of chemically reactive silanol groups. The most
useful bonded-phase coatings are siloxanes
formed by reaction of the hydrolyzed surface
with an organochlorosilane.
• Reversed-Phase and Normal-Phase Packings
Two types of partition chromatography are
distinguishable based upon the relative polarities
of the mobile and stationary phases.
Liquid chromatography based upon highly polar
stationary phases such as water or
triethyleneglycol supported on silica or alumina
particles; a relatively nonpolar solvent such as
hexane or I-propylether then served as the mobile
phase. This type of chromatography is referred to
as normal-phase chromatography.
In reversed-phase chromatography, the
stationary phase is nonpolar, often a
hydrocarbon, and the mobile phase is relatively
polar (such as water, methanol, or acetonitrile).
In normal-phase chromatography, the least polar
component is eluted first because it is the most
soluble in the mobile phase; increasing the
polarity of the mobile phase has the effect of
decreasing the elution time.
In contrast, in the reversed-phase method, the
most polar component appears first, and
increasing the mobile phase polarity increases
the elution time.
 HPLC Derivatization Methods
• Why derivatize?
• Enhance detector response
• Improve analyte resolution
• Improve analyte peak shape
• Improve analyte sensitivity
• Establish analyte identity
• Improve analyte stability during analysis
• Change analyte physical properties
 Preparative Chromatography
• Separation and isolation of relatively large
quantities (> 0.1g) of solute
• Similar systems to analytical chromatography
- higher flow rates (10 to 200 mL/min)
- Large sample loops
- preparative columns - larger dimensions
and packing size
- detection not critical - not trace analysis -
but non-destructive
 Chromatographic Separations
• Open column chromatography
- Very slow analysis
- Poor chromatographic efficiency
- Inconvenient sample recovery
• HPLC
- More rapid analysis
- High efficiency packing materials
- continuous flow-through detection
 Gel Permeation LC
• Also known as size exclusion or gel filtration
• Separation by effective size in solution
- dependent on molecular size and shape
- molecules large enough to be excluded
from pores all co-elute at tm
- smaller molecules permeate the sp
pores to differing degrees based on
relative size and are proportionally
retarded.
 GPLC Stationary Phases
• Stationary phase controls retention or
selection
• Two types: rigid cross-linked polymer gels
and other polymer gels
• Classification by pore size, or range of pore
sizes
• Small molecules - pores 60 to 100Å
• Mixed bed columns for wide size ranges
 GPLC Mobile Phases
• Mobile phase not generally used to control
retention or selection
• Selection primarily based on solubility
- low viscosity solvent
- detector compatible
- column compatible
polstryrene - less polar solvents
silica gel - water, wide range of
solvents, limited pH
 Ion Exchange Chromatography

• Reversible exchange of ionic species

between the stationary phase and mobile
phase
• Ionic species chemically bound to insoluble
matrix serves as exchange site (adsorption)
 IEC Separations

• Insoluble matrix (M+) and counter ion (E-)

as stationary phase
• Analyte ion (A-) in mobile phase

M+E- + A- M+A- + E-
 IEC Stationary Phases
• Silica based materials
- Pellicular particles
• Organic materials
- porous beads
- styrene/divinylbenzene crosslinked co-
polymers
- methacrylic acid/divinylbenzene
crosslinked co-polymers
• Inorganic materials
 IEC Stationary Phases

• Functional group addition through surface

reactions with appropriate reagents to
produce the desired cation or anion
exchange resin
• Cation exchangers (strong & weak)
- Acid functional groups
• Anion exchangers (strong & weak)
- Basic functional groups
 Resin Cross-linkage

• Pore size a degree of crosslinkage

• High degrees of Crosslinkage:
- increase mechanical strength of the resin
- decrease the degree of swelling
- decrease the permeability of the resin
 IEC Mobile Phases

• Aqueous solutions of salt or salts with a

small % of organic modifier and perhaps a
buffer
 Retention & Selectivity Factors

• Size and shape of the solvated molecule

• Mobile phase pH
• Concentration & type of competing ion
• Addition of organic solvent to mobile phase
• Column temperature
 Cation M-A+ Bond Strengths

• Ce3+ > Al3+ >> Ba2+ > Pb2+ > Ca2+

> Ni2+ > Cu2+ > Mg2+ > UO22+ >>
Tl+ > Ag+ > K+ > NH4+ > H+
 Anion M+A- Bond Strengths

• Citrate > SCN- > CrO42- > SO42- >

NO3- > Br- > CN- > Cl- > HCO3- >
HCOO- > OH-

Anion selectivities are not as rigidly

defined as those of cations
 Prediction of MxAy Bond Strengths
• Factors:
- charge on the solute ion
- size of the solvated ion
- degree of resin crosslinkage
- polarizability of the solute molecule
- ion-exchange capacity of the resin
- functional group on the resin
- degree of interaction between the
solute and the resin
 Ion Chromatography

• Separation of inorganic cations and anions

and low molecular weight water-soluble
organic acids and bases
• Non-suppressed IC methods
• Suppressed IC methods
 Ion Exclusion Chromatography

• Separation of ionic solutes from weakly

ionized of neutral solutes using strong
cation and anion exchange resins
 Factors Affecting Retention in IC
• Degree of ionization of the solute
- solute pKa
- eluent pH
- organic modifier content
• hydrophobic interactions between solute
and sp
• molecular size of the solute
• degree of X-linkage of the sp
• system temperature
 Affinity Chromatography
• Separation of proteins and biomolecules
through the use of a biologically specific
immobilized ligand (sp).
• Biologically specific ligand is chemically
attached to a gel matrix
• pH of the system is controlled to control the
strength of the interaction between the
ligand and the solute molecule
 Complexation Chromatography

• Separation based on the rapid reversible

formation of a complex between metal ions
and ligands
• Suitable ligands are immobilized on sp
 Chiral Chromatography

• Separation based on the use of chiral

stationary phases which interact to varing
degrees with optical isomers of the solute
• Systems differ little from conventional
HPLC systems
• Limited applications for a given sp